Han

漢

HAN 

In 221 BC the Qin Dynasty succeed in uniting all of China under the rule of a single monarch, for the first time in hundreds of years. Qin pursued a policy of ruthless centralisation and standardisation in the hope of making that union permanent. In the short term they failed, for with the death of the First Qin Emperor, Qin Shi Huang, the entire ediface came crashing down. They were to be replaced by the Han Dynasty, which was to succeed where the Qin Dynasty had failed. Thus in the long term, the history of Han is the story of how a disparate region was forged into a single nation. By the time the Han Dynasty fell, after over four hundred years of rule, what had once been novel was well and truly traditional. To this day, ethnic Chinese call themselves and their culture "Han" and look back on the period as their first golden age.

The Qin Dynasty had been managing a very delicate mass of competing forces; forces which spun dangerously out of control with the Emperor's death in 210 BC. The central court became occupied with a power struggle, while in the provinces regional identities, entirely suppressed under Qin rule, began to reassert themselves. A number of rebel groups rose up, dominant among them being the forces of Xiàng Yǔ (項 羽), a native of Chu in the far southeast. Under a puppet emperor - a peasant boy, whom he claimed was a descendent of the old royal family of Chu, Xiang Yu successfully defeated Qin at the Battle of Julu. At this point, he seemed destined for dominance, but while he had broken Qin, it was not Xiang, but another rebel, Liú Bāng (劉 邦), who reached the Qin Capital first and received the official surrender from the central government. When Xiang did arrive, he invited Liu  to dine with him and attempted to have him murdered, but Liu escaped and set up his own kingdom on the Han River. The more important of the other rebels also received their own kingdoms and soon all had declared either for Xiang or for Liu. The situation rapidly descended into civil war - the Chu-Han Contention (206 - 202 BC). It was said that Xiang Yu was the superior general, but arrogant and entirely self-reliant, while Liu Bang, though not as competant, recognised and encouraged the talents of his subordinates. This proved the better course, and at Gaixia in 202 BC, Xiang Yu was defeated and killed by Liu's allies Han Xin and Peng Yue. Liu Bang declared himself Emperor of the new Han Dynasty and established a new capital at Cháng'ān (長安), very near the old Qin Capital and he adopted many aspects of the Qin Emperor's administration, including standardised weights and measures and a bureaucracy. Unlike the Qin, he did not totally centralise authority, but granted large sections of the country as private kingdoms to his relatives and most important subordinates.

The trouble was not over, however. While Liu Bang had been reunifying China, the nomadic tribes of the north, the Xiongnu, had also been unified, by Shanyu Modo. He invaded in 200 BC - Liu Bang went to face him personally, and was surrounded and beseiged at Baideng. Only by making embarrassing concessions did he secure his escape, and much as they tried to ignore the fact, throughout this period it was the Xiongnu (dismissed by the Chinese as barbarians) who were the stronger power.

As he grew older, Liu Bang grew ever more suspiscious of those around him- he who had once been praised for the trust he placed in his subordinates now believed them to be plotting against them. One by one he removed them from their kingdoms, banished them from public life, or killed them. By his death in 195 BC, most of those responsible for the rise of the Han Dynasty had become its victims. It was said that he was motivated in this by his domineering with, the Empress Lǚ (呂), and with his death, and the succession of her son as Emperor, she certainly became the main force in government - slaughtering her enemies among Liu Bang's ministers and concubines. Her son, scarred by the brutal murders which befell those around, especially the deaths of his favoured half brothers, retreated into alcoholism. When he died, Empress Lǚ placed a succession of infant children on the throne and ruled through them. Opinion differed on whether they were actually members of the Imperial family. Increasingly she worked to bring other members of the Lǚ family into power, hoping to give them kingdoms, in direct contravention of her late husband's will. They were corrupt and deeply hated. When she finally died in 180 BC, they moved to make their power permanent. This was a step far too far and several of Liu Bang's sons and sidelined ministers forged an edict, which they used to seize control of the guards of the Capital, beseige the Palace and slaughtered the entire Lǚ clan. 

One of Liu Bang's sons was brought in and placed on the throne as the Emperor Wéndì (文帝) (180 - 157), who was idealised by later generations for the peace and prosperity of his reign (which is to say that little of interest happened in his reign). It was not to last- his brothers and nephews, who had eliminated the Lǚ clan and put him on the throne, were increasingly jealous of his status. Matters got worse when his son killed his cousin the Crown Prince of Wu in a rage. That son succeeded as Emperor Jǐngdì (景帝) (157 - 141), and immediately began to fine them and seize portions of their territory on minor technicalities. In 154 BC seven of them revolted in the Rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms. The whole eastern half of the Empire declared against the Emperor, and for a time things looked dire, but the rebellion got bogged down beseiging Suiyang in the still-loyal Kingdom of Liang and then again beseiging Linzi in Qi. The forces of the Emperor eventually defeated the beseigers and then picked off the kingdoms one-by-one. Prior to this the kingdoms had each been almost independent, but in the wake of the Rebellion, they were downsized and placed under the control of the central government, which now appointed all the officials in each kingdom, as well as a number of "tutors" who were to monitor the behaviour of the Kings and report their infelicities to the Emperor. 

His successor was Emperor Wǔdì (武帝) (141 - 87), whose reign was the second-longest in Chinese history. Under his reign the empire reached its peak of prosperity, and Han armies conquered Central Asia, Korea, Vietnam and even enjoyed some erratic success against the Xiongnu. He is traditionally denigrated, because he had the historian Sima Qian imprisoned and castrated- and it is the historians who determine for us all who are the good and who the bad. Sima Qian had material to work with, though: Wǔdì gave great favours to miracleworkers in the hope that they would grant him eternal life, and became increasingly suspiscious of his subordinates and family - he drove the Crown Prince to forge edicts and attempt to seize the government in 94, an abortive coup which led to the Prince's death. Instead, Wǔdì was succeeded by his very youngest son, Emperor Zhāodì (昭帝) (87 - 74),  who was only eight years old. Two officials competed for control of the government, Huò Guāng (霍 光) and Shàngguān Jié (上官 桀). Initially the latter was successful, but he went too far, plotting to murder Huo and put a puppet prince on the throne (or possibly take it for himself). When this was discovered in 80, Huo had them all executed. He was now entirely dominant, but did not seize power for himself, and therefore became famous as an example of a loyal minister. When the Emperor died, he selected the Chāngyí-wáng Hè (昌邑王 賀) as new emperor, but he proved grossly unsuitable, spoilt and corrupt, so Huo removed him; thereby establishing the constitutional principle that, for the good of the state, a loyal minister might depose the sovereign himself. 

Huo chose Xuāndì (宣帝) (74 - 49 BC), as the new Emperor, and offered to turn all power over to him. This was refused, and Huo remained in power until his death in 68, when he was honoured as the paradigmatic good minister. The precedent of the all-powerful minister would prove a dangerous one, however.  In the meanwhile, though, things were good. The Xiongnu collapsed into civil war, and split into multiple kingdoms, all of which accepted Han overlordship.  This allowed the Emperor to cut back the army further- another act with dangerous implications for the future. He was followed by Emperor Yuándì (元帝) (49 - 33 BC), who presided over the full subordination of the Xiongnu in 36 when the last of the recalcitrant factions was eliminated. Worryingly, however, this was carried out by officials acting illegally, in contravention of their orders and of their own volition. At the central court, things were no better- the officials split into competing factions and worked to manufacture controversies and delude the Emperor into executing their enemies. He also married into the Wang family, who were increasingly powerful, rich, and corrupt. Among them was an idealistic young Confucian,Wáng Măng (王 莽). Orphaned young, he worked his way up the ranks under Emperor Chéngdì (成帝) (33 - 7 BC), an unimpressive ruler, who was occupied by the scandels of his harem and only too happy to allow the Wang family to take control of government.

When he died, power was handed to Emperor Āidì (哀帝) (7 - 1 BC), with Wang Mang as regent. Āidì was not a good Emperor- caught between his mother, the Dowager Fu, and his lover Dǒng Xián (董 賢), on whom he showered endless favours to the disgust of everyone. Wang Mang stood apart from this, and looked increasingly attractive as an alternative. When Āidì died, Wang Mang returned to act as regent for the new Emperor Píngdì (平帝) (1 BC - AD 5), with full power. An ardent Confucianist, Wang Mang began to 'restore' the Empire to the form that it had supposedly taken in the most ancient of days. This was deeply popular with the Confucians in government, who sent petitions that he be honoured, which were accepted, bringing honour to him, but also to the petitioners, inspiring more ministers to send petitions that Wang Mang be honoured further. Thousands of new petitions arrived everyday, as Wang Mang worked to present himself as the ideal Confucian minister. And then the young Emperor died. Later generations claimed that Wang Mang poisoned him, but this seems unlikely - Wang Mang performed rites for the sickening Emperor offering his life up in exchange for the Emperors and he had no reason to believe that such rites would be ineffective.

But with the Emperors death, Wang Mang took total power, with a puppet Emperor at first, but in AD 9 he dispensed with even that and took the throne as the first and only Emperor of the Xin Dynasty (新 - meaning "New"). It turned out, however, that the model minister was not a model ruler. His plans were exceptionally idealistic, nationalisation and redistribution of land so that every peasant would have an equal plot, abolition of slavery, tax on the lazy, and state monopolies. These policies did not work in the real world. Peasants were outraged at the government for taking their land, and, when the Yellow River burst its banks and famine struck, they became furious. Officials were alienated by his failure to pay salaries. In addition to all of this, he adopted an exceptionally haughty attitude to the 'barbarians'  and the formally becalmed Xiongnu became hostile once more, raiding the north, adding further to the problems of the peasants who now began to revolt.

One of these revolutionaries was Liú Boshēng (劉 伯升), a member of the Han Dynasty, who, in AD 22, rebelled, kidnapping the local governor and taking control of Nanyang. Shortly thereafter, he was killed by a distant cousin, who proclaimed himself Emperor Gèngshĭdì (更始帝) (AD 22 - 25). His forces were soon beseiging the Capital, where Wang Mang retaliated by carrying out all the correct ceremonies and rites - which was not efficacious. Gèngshĭdì did not prove better, however. He sent a trusted lieutenant, Liú Boshēng's brother, to secure the rest of the country, but he could not even control the capital region, and was soon beseiged by peasant rebels who called themselves the Red Eyebrows. He called for his trusted lieutenant to return, but he, remembering Liú Boshēng, stayed back while the Red Eyebrows seized the Capital and killed him. Only then did the lieutenant return to be crowned as Emperor Guāngwǔdì (光武帝) (AD 25 - 57). With his reign prosperity returned and his restored dynasty is known as Later Han. He shifted the capital from Cháng'ān (長安) to Luòyáng (洛陽), in the east, for which reason the dynasty is also known as the Eastern Han.

The new dynasty slowly restored order, mopping up the remaining rebel groups and deterring raids by the nomads - largely dealt with by the establishment of vast unoccupied buffer regions, a de facto retreat from the older borders. But some form of prosperity returned, and continued to be rebuilt under Emperor Míngdì (明帝) (57 - 75) and Emperor Zhāngdì (章帝) (75 - 88) under whom the southern half of the Xiongnu came to be vassals and control was reestablished in Central Asia. The highest level subdivision was shifted down a level, meaning that the central government was far more involved in provincial affairs than ever before, both for good- better control, and for ill- increasing expenses and increased danger in times of weak central government. Unfortunately the Eastern Han Dynasty was to experience a very weak central government, for Zhāngdì was the last Emperor of Han to ascend the throne as an adult- for the next century Emperors would come to the throne as children (often only distant relatives of the previous emperor), and dominated by Dowager Empresses and Regents. 

The first of these, Emperor Hédì (和帝) 88 - 105, was dominated by the Dòu (竇) clan of the Empress Dowager. Her brother, Dòu Xiàn (窦宪), was so corrupt and embarrassing that he was dispatched north to fight the Northern Xiongnu. Astonishingly, he defeated them at Ikh Bayan, utterly destroying them. The remnants fled west to become, some scholars believe, the Huns which under Attila would bring the Roman Empire to its knees. If this event was a cause of destruction for the West, then it was also one for China - with the weak Northern Xiongnu eliminated, a new, far more dynamic, steppe confederacy began to form, the Xianbei, who would one day  become the first of the northern nomads to conquer China. On his return Xiàn was in total control of government, but he was so cruel and arrogant that the Emperor, together with some loyal eunuchs launched a coup in 92 and took control for themselves. This was another forboding sign - the eunuchs would be a powerful force for the rest of the Dynasty. 

The Dowager Empress Deng (鄧) was Regent for the Emperor Āndì (安帝) (106 - 125), first while he was a youth, and then when he grew up to be a self-indulgent creature of the harem. Fortunately Deng was a very competant ruler, as the Empire faced famine, floods and invasions from the Qiang and the Southern Xiongnu.  She met these challenges, but died in 121, and Āndì, used to having someone to rule for him looked for advice to his wife's family, the Yán (閻) clan. This was less fortunate, for they were committed only to their personal enrichment and were not capable of dealing with the attacks from the nomads or the natural disasters. When he died they even refused to allow his son and heir to succeed to the throne, but the eunuchs, again, rose up and placed him on the throne as Emperor Shùndì (順帝) (125 - 144). His reign saw the return of a modicum of prosperity, but at the end, things unravelled, with further rebellions, and an invasion by the Qiang from the west, which reached the old capital of Cháng'ān (長安).

With his death, the Liáng (梁) clan came to power, with the brother of the Empress Dowager Liáng Jì (梁 冀) dominating a series of child emperors. The last of these, Emperor Húandì (桓帝) (146 - 168), managed to kill Liang, with the help of the eunuchs in 159. A great purge of Liang's supporters was carried out, and their wealth confiscated. This meant a loss of institutional knowledge. He also instituted the sale of offices. Eunuchs and officials clashed repeatedly, and the students at the university protested outspokenly in favour of the latter. He was followed by Emperor Língdì (靈帝) (168 - 189), who was worse. Raised by the eunuchs, he was entirely spoilt, and unable to accept any criticism. While he built pleasure gardens and marshalled his attendents as play-armies, plague ravaged the empire. A sect of faith-healers, the Tàipíng (太平) (not the last Chinese cult of this name) spread throughout the realm and plotted against the empire. When the Emperor finally discovered he attempted to wipe them out, but this only spurred them to outright rebellion - The Yellow Turban Rebellion of 183. The Rebellion consumed the entire empire, and while it was put down within a year, it really marked the beginning of the end. Local militiae formed throughout the empire and their leaders became local warlords and began to accrete greater territories, all effectively independent of the central authority.

Yet another infant succeeded at the Capital of Luòyáng (洛陽). By now, officials were well and truly used to ruling for themselves. The first of these was Hé Jìn (何 進), who planned to annihilate the eunuchs once and for all by secretly inviting the warlords / generals to enter the capital and kill them all. It was a simple plan. Unfortunatly, they killed him first, but shortly after, one of the generals, Dǒng Zhuó (董 卓), arrived, kidnapped an Imperial prince and placed him on the throne as Emperor Xiàndì (獻帝) (189 - 220). Of course, it was Dǒng who was in charge of things. Deeply conscious that he was an uncouth general from the provinces, he struggled with the intrigues of the central court, driving the officials to a rebellion under the warlord Yuán Shào (袁 紹) in 190. This fizzled outside the walls of Luòyáng, but Dǒng was frightened enough to relocate the Imperial court to the old capital of Cháng'ān (長安); thus the dynasty returned to die at the place of its birth. Luòyáng was left abandoned, all for naught, as Dǒng was assassinated in 192. The Emperor's person was controlled by a succession of warlords until finally in 196 he came under the control of Cáo Cāo (曹 操), a general both brilliant and cruel. Almost immediately he had complete control of the Emperor and slowly he unified northern China. He was unable to take control of the southeast, where Sūn Quán (孫 權) ruled the State of Eastern Wú (吳), or the southwest, where Cáo Cāo's former lieutenant, Liú Bèi (劉 備) ruled the State of Southern Han. Cáo Cāo's attempt to deal to the south foundered at the Battle of the Red Cliffs in 208, when he was prevented from crossing the Yangtze. After his death in 220, his son succeeded to his position of primacy, and then seized the throne for himself, founding the State of Cáo Wèi (曹 魏), finally bringing the Han Dynasty to an end and beginning the Three Kingdoms Period. 

SOURCES

This Dynasty is complicated and long, so a chart is provided below: